Stress monitoring in a Guinness 10-day scuba dive

Nowadays, there is high demand for sensitive gas sensors both for human and environmental monitoring. This paper deals with a high-resolution (0.2 ppb) laser-based photoacoustic spectroscopic system realized at ENEA Frascati, Italy, applied for monitoring stress in scuba divers during sustained immersion by analyzing breath samples. Blood tests and psychometric tests for scuba divers were performed at Catholic University in Rome. Results will be reported and discussed.     

Conditions of stability of magnetic sublattices at exchange mixing of states with different spins

The conditions of compatibility of the magnetic sublattice hypothesis with the requirements of quantum theory have been derived. These conditions imply the presence of (even weak) magnetic anisotropy and a macroscopic number of spins in the sublattice.     

Effect of oxygen stoichiometry and microstructure on superconducting properties of YBaCuO films

Microstructure and oxygen stoichiometry of YBaCuO films manufactured by laser ablation are investigated. Dependence of the specific electrical resistivity and superconducting parameters of films on microstructure and oxygen stoichiometry is demonstrated. Conditions of deposition are determined, under which films with minimum microstructure defects and good conducting properties are formed. __________ Translated from Izvestiya Vysshikh Uchebnykh Zavedenii, Fizika, No. 2, pp. 41–45, February, 2007.     

Romanovski polynomials in selected physics problems

We briefly review the five possible real polynomial solutions of hypergeometric differential equations. Three of them are the well known classical orthogonal polynomials, but the other two are different with respect to their orthogonality properties. We then focus on the family of polynomials which exhibits a finite orthogonality. This family, to be referred to as the Romanovski polynomials, is required in exact solutions of several physics problems ranging from quantum mechanics and quark physics to random matrix theory. It appears timely to draw attention to it by the present study. Our survey also includes several new observations on the orthogonality properties of the Romanovski polynomials and new developments from their Rodrigues formula.     

Small silver particles in glass surface layers produced by sodium-silver ion exchange — their concentration and size depth profile

Small spherical silver particles in a surface layer of commercial flat glass were produced by means of sodium-silver ion exchange. In each volume element of the layer there is a Gaussian distribution of the particle diameters. The mean diameter increases with penetration depth. Within one individual sample it can vary from 4.5 nm immediately at the glass surface up to more than 50 nm at the end of the layer. Due to a special preparation technique the results were gained by microspectrophotometric measurements as well as by investigations carried out with the transmission electron microscope and the electron-probe microanalyzer on one and the same sample always as function of the penetration depth.     

Achievement of laser fusion of biological cells using UV pulsed dye laser beams

This paper reports a successful achievement of laser-induced biological cell fusion using an excimer laser excited dye laser. To our knowledge, we examined for the first time the dependence of fusion rate on laser pulse energy, number of laser pulses, and laser wavelength. Maximum fusion rate of approximately 50% was obtained by this laser fusion technology.     

Characterization and Thermal Behaviour of Garnets from Almandine–Pyrope Series at 1200°C

Hyperfine Interactions - The natural garnets from almandine (Fe3Al2Si3O12)–pyrope (Mg3Al2Si3O12) series with the iron to magnesium atomic ratio ranging from 0.2 to 1 were characterised and...     

Thermal degradation of two liquid fuels and detonation tests for pulse detonation engine studies

The use of liquid fuels such as kerosene is of interest for the pulse detonation engine (PDE). Within this context, the aim of this work, which is a preliminary study, was to show the feasibility to initiate a detonation in air with liquid-fuel pyrolysis products, using energies and dimensions of test facility similars to those of PDEs. Therefore, two liquids fuels have been compared, JP10, which is a synthesis fuel generally used in the field of missile applications, and decane, which is one of the major components of standard kerosenes (F-34, Jet A1, ...). The thermal degradation of these fuels was studied with two pyrolysis processes, a batch reactor and a flow reactor. The temperatures varied from 600°C to 1,000°C and residence times for the batch reactor and the flow reactor were, respectively, between 10–30 s and 0.1–2 s. Subsequently, the detonability of synthetic gaseous mixtures, which was a schematisation of the decomposition state after the pyrolysis process, has been studied. The detonability study, regarding nitrogen dilution and equivalence ratio, was investigated in a 50 mm-diameter, 2.5 m-long detonation tube. These dimensions are compatible with applications in the aircraft industry and, more particularly, in PDEs. Therefore, JP10 and decane were compared to choose the best candidate for liquid-fuel PDE studies. This paper was based on work that was presented at the 20th International Colloquium on the Dynamics of Explosions and Reactive Systems, Montreal, Canada, July 31 – August 5, 2005.     

The fracture energy of materials under pulse microsecond-scale loading

Based on the results of fracture in polymethyl methacrylate and a spheroplastic using a magnetic-pulse setup, the specific work of the formation of a new surface is estimated, which is similar to Griffith’s surface energy for quasi-static tests. The value obtained is greater than the corresponding value determined from the quasi-static tests by an order of magnitude and tends to increase as the loading time decreases.     

Asymptotic conditions for the electromagnetic form factors of hadrons represented by the VMD model

A system of linear homogeneous algebraic equations for the coupling constant ratios of vector mesons to hadrons is derived by imposing the assumed asymptotic behavior upon the VMD pole parameterization of an hadron electromagnetic form factor. A similar system of equations with a simpler structure of the coefficients, taken as even powers of the vector-meson masses, is derived by means of integral superconvergent sum rules for the imaginary part of the considered form factor using its appropriate -function approximation. Although both systems have been derived starting from different properties of the electromagnetic form factor and they each have their own appearances, it is shown explicitly that they are fully equivalent. Received: 20 March 2002 / Revised version: 3 December 2002 / Published online: 7 March 2003